Friday, October 31, 2008

WFMU's blog site posts MP3's of many many of the LP's from their collection. I found today that the entire album "Music To Suffer By", recorded by Leona Anderson — whose immortal "Fish" and "Rats in My Room" were Kovacs show staples — are posted there.

Click here to go to the WFMU blog page for the album, where you can listen to and or download the entire album as well as see hi-res images of the front and back of the LP sleeve. The back has liner notes and photos of the recording session.

Wednesday, October 22, 2008

Good evening Kovacsians. When Edie Adams passed away last week I sent an email to our good friend Jack Phillippe, who grew up in Philadelphia and as a young man was a guest on a January 1952 episode of "Kovacs On The Corner."

Hearing of Edie's passing made Jack reminisce about growing up in Philly during the 1950's and watching the great television shows of that time. He wanted to share some artifacts from his collection with all of us and has been gracious enough to take the time to send me some scans.

The first is of an EEFMS card; it's an original from Ernie's very first show on WPTZ Channel Three, NBC in Philadelphia, "3 To Get Ready." Jack sent this once before and I posted it, but this time its a bit bigger and clearer. Enjoy:

One staple of Philadelphia televison in the 1950s was Officer Pete Boyle, played by that icon of Philadelphia Kids' TV Peter Boyle Sr.. Pete Sr. was the father of the late actor Peter Boyle Jr. most recently of "Everybody Loves Raymond" fame. "Offcier Pete Boyle" appeared in his own shows on WPTZ and many times as a guest on Ernie's. In fact, he played his "Officer Boyle" character the day that Jack appeared as a guest on "KOTC!"

Jack went to high school with Peter Boyle Jr. in the 1950s and Peter was an actor even back then. These photos are some extracts from a playbill that Jack kept from his high school days; they're for a musical called "Song Of Norway" in which the young Mr. Boyle appeared.

P.S.- The Ernie Kovacs My Space Fan Page is up to 828 friends since our last post. As always we thank everyone who requested an add or accepted a request from us. We also thank you for the nice comments sent about Edie.

Thursday, October 16, 2008

It is with great sadness that fans everywhere mourn the death of the wonderful Ms. Edie Adams, who passed away on October 15th, 2008 at the age of 81. According to her son Josh Mills the cause of death was cancer and pneumonia.

My fellow Kovacs Blogger Ben Model took the time today to compile some information which I've taken and consolidated into this post. Thanks Ben.

Here's you go folks, courtesy of Ben Model:

Edie Adams' obituary appears in today's New York Times, written by Bruce Weber. To read it, click here.

Among Edie's major accomplishments, although not mentioned in the obit, is the fact that she spent decades saving and hunting down Kovacs programs...scripts, kinescopes, 2" master tapes etc etc. She was an amazing woman, full of life and always working on some project or other, and she will be missed.

Monday, October 13, 2008

Albert Wein (1915-1991), who did set design for some of Ernie's ABC specials, has a career retrospective at the Boston Athenaeum, running through the end of November. Entitled "Albert Wein: American Modernist," the exhibit showcases more than 50 of his classic sculptures, paintings and medals. The use of sculptures and special props like that are in quite a few of the 1961 programs, and I'm sure the sculpture of a woman with a hole in her stomach being carved by Miklos Molnar was one of Wein's creations. There's a link to an article on the retrospective here, and the museum's website is here.

The photograph is of a sculpture of Bacchus by Wein hung in Ernie's wine cellar.

Ben, thanks for a great post. I want to add that back in December of 2006 sculptor Michael Keropian let me know about the website for Al Wein. Michael worked for Al and as far as I know is still involved with his art work. This is a great site and I strongly suggest that all Kovacs fans pay a visit!

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On Tuesday, November 19, 2013, MVD Entertainment Group will release "Here's Edie: The Edie Adams Television Collection"! This is a 4 DVD, 12 hr set of the
entire run of Edie Adams variety show which aired on ABC from 1962-64. It is the first-ever release of her classic variety show after more than 50 years.
Bonus material includes Edie''s musical numbers from the Ernie Kovacs show, a 16-page booklet with rare photos, program notes and her iconic Muriel Cigar
commercials. Here's a link to a press release which also lists the contents of the DVDs. Keep your eye on the links page where a link, when available, will be posted so you can pre-order the set.

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Links To Ernie Kovacs Merchandise

On this blog and its parent site Ernie Kovacs Dot Net A Tribute To Television's Original Genius you will see links to the majority of Ernie's material which is available for purchase. This includes (but is not necessarily limited to): Books, DVDs, tapes, CDs and memorabilia on various auction sites. A great deal of time and effort has gone into searching for and compiling lists of all that is available from sites that are reputable. We don't, however, assume any responsibility if you are unhappy with a purchase you make from one of these sites.

The only items that were sold directly by this blog and its parent site are from The Vision Of Ernie Kovacs retrospect; we had the inventory and we shipped it but it has sold out (you can click the link to learn more about these items in case you'd like to purchase them from other sources). We also offer "The Ernie Kovacs Collection" DVD set through our sites but we are not the shipper; the set is shipped to you directly from Shout Factory Video. You can buy this wonderful set with confidence and we fully endorse it.

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About This Blog

This blog is written by Kovacs fans Al Quagliata and Ben Model. Al started writing for Ben's EK website in the mid 90s and then started his own. This is the middle ground where these two Kovacsians meet to bring you all the latest goodies from Kovacsland!

Video And Audio Clips On This Site

My name is Al Quagliata; I’m the editor of this blog and run the website Ernie Kovacs Dot Net A Tribute To Televsion's Original Genius. Even though Ernie Kovacs was the original video comedian and was so visual, there are very few clips on this blog and on my website. In most cases I can’t verify that the parties who post these clips (e.g. on sites such as YouTube and Facebook) have the right to do so and it’s not up to me to decide if they do, so as a general rule I don’t post clips. My feeling is that this material should be legally purchased so that the royalties go to the parties who own the rights. And, just because you purchase something, that doesn’t give you the right to post it online. In some cases the rights holders allow this streaming content on sites they run; that’s their call and has nothing to do with me, nor am I going to presume that I can do it without permission.

This goes for audio too: recordings of novelty songs, music from the Kovacs shows and various EK sketches, some of which are available on CD or LP. I understand that sometimes these items are hard to find but I am not going to provide links to free downloads.

With all this in mind please do not contact me asking for copies of videos, DVDs, CDs, LPs, or to ask me to stream video. I will not post ANY links to file sharing sites which are sent to me nor will I respond to any emails regarding same.

I can offer the following: The Museum Of Broadcast Communications in Chicago has their archives listed online so you can view the list. Some of these listings have a digital file accompanying them for viewing and ⁄ or listening. Sign up is free and there are some very interesting EK files available to watch and listen to online. My assumption is that a broadcast museum is not just putting up clips without permission which is why I’m willing to list the link.

While they don't have online viewing, you can visit the Paley Center For Media in New York or Los Angeles to view shows in their massive collection. The link will take you to a listing of everything they have regarding Ernie Kovacs so that you can plan your visit; you're limited as to how much time you can spend in the museum library and how many shows you can view on your visit so you wouldn't want to spend all of it searching the database. Write down the catalog numbers and titles of the programs you wish to see, which will make finding them easy once you arrive. Contact the museum for more details.

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